WHO IS SATAN AND HIS DEMONS?
Notes
Transcript
BODY MIND AND SPIRIT
BODY MIND AND SPIRIT
THE WORD SATAN TRANSLATED FROM THE HEBREW MEANS ADVERSARY/ACCUSER IT IS ACTUALLY CALLED “THE SATAN”
IT IS NOT HIS NAME IT IS A TITLE - HE IS ANTI EVERYTHING
AN OPPONENT OR A FOE, ONE THAT SPEAKS AGAINST ANOTHER, A COMPLAINANT.
WE FIRST ENCOUNTER THIS ADVERSARY IN THE BOOK OF GENESIS WHERE HE IS OPERATING UNDER THE GUISE OF A SERPENT.
BUT I THINK OUR BIGGER QUESTION IS WHY WOULD GOD CREATE AN ADVERSARY?
THE BIBLE RECORDS THAT GOD CREATED A BEAUTIFUL , POWERFUL, ANGELIC BEING
SCRIPTURE SLIDE
13 You were in Eden, the garden of God. Your clothing was adorned with every precious stone— red carnelian, pale-green peridot, white moonstone, blue-green beryl, onyx, green jasper, blue lapis lazuli, turquoise, and emerald— all beautifully crafted for you and set in the finest gold. They were given to you on the day you were created.
14 I ordained and anointed you as the mighty angelic guardian. You had access to the holy mountain of God and walked among the stones of fire.
15 “You were blameless in all you did from the day you were created until the day evil was found in you.
16 Your rich commerce led you to violence, and you sinned. So I banished you in disgrace from the mountain of God. I expelled you, O mighty guardian, from your place among the stones of fire.
17 Your heart was filled with pride because of all your beauty. Your wisdom was corrupted by your love of splendor. So I threw you to the ground and exposed you to the curious gaze of kings.
AS I WAS READING VERSE 13 - I WAS REMINDED OF THE WORDS OF PAUL IN EPHESIANS CHAPTER 1
3 All praise to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms because we are united with Christ.
BUT LUCIFER NOT UNLIKE US GOD CREATED HIM WITH A WILL JUST LIKE US - HE COULD MAKE CHOICES
HE CHOSE TO SET HIMSELF ABOVE GOD
SCRIPTURE SLIDE
12 “How you are fallen from heaven, O shining star, son of the morning! You have been thrown down to the earth, you who destroyed the nations of the world.
13 For you said to yourself, ‘I will ascend to heaven and set my throne above God’s stars. I will preside on the mountain of the gods far away in the north.
14 I will climb to the highest heavens and be like the Most High.’
BEAUTY
WISDOM
POWER / MIGHT
GOD CREATED HIM THIS WAY - SO ALL THE GOOD THINGS IN HIM CREATED BY GOD CAUSED HIM TO FALL INTO PRIDE WHICH LED TO HIS REBELLION AND THE ULTIMATE FALL FROM HEAVEN.
His strategy was to enlist mankind to join him – by tempting them to succumb to the same choice that he made –
to love themselves,
become autonomous from God,
and defy Him.
THE RESULT IS THE SAME WE THEN CHOOSE TO BE OUR OWN GOD.
THE SCRIPTURES IN ISAIAH ARE DIRECTED TO THE KING OF BABYLON AND IN EZEKIEL THE KING OF TYRE
But from the descriptions given, it is obvious that no human is addressed. The “I wills” in Isaiah describe a being who was cast to the earth in punishment for wanting to place his throne above the stars of God.
The passage in Ezekiel addresses one who is an ‘angelic guardian’ who once moved in Eden and the ‘mountain of God’.
This tendency of Satan (or Lucifer) to position himself behind or through someone else is consistent.
In the Genesis fall he speaks through the serpent. In Isaiah he rules through the King of Babylon, and in Ezekiel he possesses the King of Tyre.
Picture Lucifer being created and becoming conscious sometime in creation week, somewhere in the cosmos. All he knows is that now he exists and is self-aware, and there is also another Being who claims to have created him and all the cosmos. But how does Lucifer know that this claim is true? Perhaps, this alleged creator popped into existence in the cosmos just before Lucifer had popped into existence. And because this ‘creator’ arrived earlier on the scene, so to speak, he was (perhaps) more powerful and (perhaps) more knowledgeable than he was – but then again perhaps not. Could it be that both he and the alleged creator had both popped into existence? Lucifer could only accept God’s Word to him that He had created Him and that God himself was eternal and infinite. And in his pride he chose to believe the fantasy that he had birthed in his own mind.
You might think it fanciful that Lucifer would believe that both he and God (and the other angels) just ‘popped’ into existence. But this is the same basic idea behind the latest and greatest of modern cosmology. There was a cosmic fluctuation of nothing – and then out of this fluctuation arose the universe – that is the essence of modern atheistic cosmological speculations.
Fundamentally, everyone – from Lucifer to Richard Dawkins & Stephen Hawkings to you & I – must decide by faith whether the universe is self-contained or was brought forth and is sustained by a Creator.
In other words, seeing is not believing. Lucifer would have seen and conversed with God. But he still would have had to accept ‘by faith’ that God had created him.
Many people say that if God would just ‘appear’ to them then they would believe. But through the Bible, many people saw and heard God – that was never the issue.
But the crux of the issue was whether they would accept and trust His Word about Himself and themselves. From Adam & Eve, to Cain & Abel, to Noah, to the Egyptians at the first Passover, to the Israelite crossing of the Red Sea all the way to those who saw the miracles of Jesus – ‘seeing’ never resulted in trust. The fall of Lucifer is consistent with this.
WHAT IS HE DOING TODAY?
So God did not make a ‘bad devil’, but created a powerful and intelligent angelic being who through his pride has led a revolt against God – and in so doing was corrupted (while still retaining) his original splendor.
You, I, and all of mankind have become part of the battleground in this contest between God and his ‘adversary’ (devil). The strategy on the part of the devil is not to go about in sinister black cloaks like the ‘Black Riders’ in the Lord of the Rings and put evil curses on us, but with his retained splendor he simply seeks to deceive us from the redemption that God has signaled at the beginning of time, through Abraham, through Moses, and then accomplished in the death and resurrection of Jesus. As the Bible says:
14 But I am not surprised! Even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light.
15 So it is no wonder that his servants also disguise themselves as servants of righteousness. In the end they will get the punishment their wicked deeds deserve.
SO WHAT ABOUT THE DEMONS?
MOSES IS THE FIRST TO ACKNOWLEDGE THEM WHEN HE TALKS ABOUT HOW THE ISREALITES
15 “But Israel soon became fat and unruly; the people grew heavy, plump, and stuffed! Then they abandoned the God who had made them; they made light of the Rock of their salvation.
16 They stirred up his jealousy by worshiping foreign gods; they provoked his fury with detestable deeds.
17 They offered sacrifices to demons, which are not God, to gods they had not known before, to new gods only recently arrived, to gods their ancestors had never feared.
SPIRITUAL FORCES AT WORK BEHIND CORRUPT HUMAN STRUCTURES
ANYTHING THAT DRAGS GODS WORLD BACK INTO DARKNESS
OVERCOME EVIL AND DEATH
JESUS TALKS TO MANY DEMONS AND CASTS THEM OUT OF VARIOUS PEOPLE IN THE GOSPELS.
Easton’s Bible Dictionary Beelzebub
BEELZEBUB—(Gr. form Beel’zebul), the name given to Satan, and found only in the New Testament (Matt. 10:25; 12:24, 27; Mark 3:22).
CONCLUSION
WE CAN USE OUR AUTHORITY IN CHRIST TO DEFEAT THE EVIL ONE THE DECIEVER
18 And he said to them, “I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven.
THIS VERSE FOLLOWS THE ACCOUNT OF JESUS DISCIPLES COMING BACK AND TELLING JESUS WHAT THEY HAD DONE WHEN HE SENT THEM TO GO AND DO MINISTRY.
THEY WERE EXCITED AND AMAZED THAT THE DEMONS OBEYED THEM
JESUS SAID IM NOT SURPRISED BECAUSE I SAW SATAN FALL LIKE LIGHTENING FROM HEAVEN. IN THE NAME OF JESUS THE SATAN HAS NO POWER.
THEY USE US TO DO THE WORK
CAUSE ENMITY
DIVISION
PRIDE
GREED
JEALOUSY
PAUL REMINDED US IN EPEHESIANS THAT OUR BATTLES ARE NOT AGAINS FLESH AND BLOOD BUT AGAINST
10 A final word: Be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power.
11 Put on all of God’s armor so that you will be able to stand firm against all strategies of the devil.
12 For we are not fighting against flesh-and-blood enemies, but against evil rulers and authorities of the unseen world, against mighty powers in this dark world, and against evil spirits in the heavenly places.
13 Therefore, put on every piece of God’s armor so you will be able to resist the enemy in the time of evil. Then after the battle you will still be standing firm.
10 The thief’s purpose is to steal and kill and destroy. My purpose is to give them a rich and satisfying life.
4 His tail swept away one-third of the stars in the sky, and he threw them to the earth. He stood in front of the woman as she was about to give birth, ready to devour her baby as soon as it was born.
THE SATANS STRATEGIES ARE TO DESTROY AND RUIN TO BLOCK GODS PLANS AND PURPOSES.
WHY?
WE ARE NOT THE TARGET - GOD IS
WE ARE CREATED IN GODS IMAGE AND THAT IS WHO SATAN IS AFTER
HE IS OUT TO DESTROY GODS CREATION BECAUSE HE CANNOT DESTROY GOD.
THERE IS POWER IN THE NAME OF JESUS.